


A Game of Cyvasse

by Isis



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Cyvasse (ASoIaF), Gen, Post - A Dance With Dragons, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:35:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23187118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isis/pseuds/Isis
Summary: “I see this is a war game,” Daenerys said, turning the piece over in her hands.  “Will it make me a better tactician when I go to war?”
Relationships: Tyrion Lannister & Daenerys Targaryen
Comments: 4
Kudos: 25
Collections: Worldbuilding Exchange 2020





	A Game of Cyvasse

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sleepless_Malice](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sleepless_Malice/gifts).



> This story adheres to existing book canon but assumes that canon's future direction is consistent with what happened in the show. The details of _cyvasse_ as given in this story are my own inventions, but are consistent with what can be gleaned from the books.

Quiet footsteps sounded at the door, and Tyrion looked up to see the queen’s pretty handmaiden, Missandei.

“The queen is bored,” said Missandei. “Her Grace requests your presence, and this one thinks it wise to see to her entertainment.” 

He sighed and put down his cup of thin Mereenese wine. “What, does she wish me to caper about and ride a pig? I don’t do that any more.”

“She is bored, and she is lonely, and she is nervous.” She crossed her arms and looked at him meaningfully. “The Stormcrows have not yet returned from their mission.”

“I doubt she wants me in her bed,” said Tyrion. “Not that I couldn’t satisfy her, of course, but –”

“This one does not care if you entertain her in her bed or on a pig. Or both at the same time,” Missandei added, though to his disappointment she did not even smile as she said it. “But it is your turn to entertain the queen.”

“Very well.” He looked around his chamber, and his eye fell on the box he’d shoved under a table. “Do you know if Her Grace is fond of _cyvasse_?”

“That is the game the soldiers play, yes? This one does not believe the queen is familiar with it.”

“I imagine Daario Naharis entertains her in rather different ways.” He reached under the table and pulled out the box. “It can’t be worse than trying to teach Penny.”

Daenerys was sitting in the sunny chamber she’d taken as her private solar, looking through scrolls that Tyrion recognized as petitions from the various nobles. He was struck, as he always was when he saw her, by how young she looked – how young she truly _was_. Her long, pale hair was braided away from her face, and her profile was serious, intent on her task.

Yet when he entered the room, she put down the scrolls with obvious relief. “Tyrion. I wish to hear stories of your travels. Something diverting, if you will.” He saw her eyes move to the box he was holding. “Unless you have something else in mind?”

“It is a game from Volantis, Your Grace.” He opened the box to display the board and the carved pieces. “It is called _cyvasse_.”

“A game?” She frowned. “Am I a child, to play games when I need to be making plans and taking care of my people?”

He took a deep breath. He had not yet become so familiar a face in her household that he could speak without careful consideration of each word. “It is not a child’s game. The mercenaries play _cyvasse_ among themselves, and the nobles often bet great sums on the best players. I would not be here with you, Your Grace, had I not learned to play this game on my travels through Essos.” It had been a long and tortuous journey, to be sure; but it had been his games with Ben Plumm that had led him to Daenerys Stormborn’s Great Pyramid.

She moved the scrolls aside, and gestured to the spot she’d cleared. Tyrion placed the board on her writing-table, and set the pieces next to it. She picked up the nearest and held it up to the light. Tyrion’s set, a gift from Yezzan zo Qaggaz, was not particularly fancy; it was wood rather than ivory and onyx, but the pieces were well-made, carved from a close-grained wood and stained with a dye that did not come off on the skin. The piece she held was a cunningly-carved crossbowman, the weapon indicated simply by a curved stave at the end of a straight stock, but it was immediately identifiable to anyone who had ever seen a crossbow, and by her expression, Daenerys certainly had.

“I see this is a war game,” she pronounced, turning it over in her hands. “Will it make me a better tactician when I go to war?”

“Perhaps. But it will certainly make your companies of sellswords _believe_ you are a better tactician. Especially if you have sufficient skill to play against them and win.”

“All right,” she said. “Teach me well enough that I may do so.”

And so Tyrion began to teach her. He started by explaining the less-powerful pieces, which were the easiest to understand: the rabble, which were individually worthless but could be dangerous in concert; the spearmen, which attacked from the front but were vulnerable from the rear; and the crossbowmen, which could bring down more powerful pieces from a distance but could be taken at close range. 

Next, he moved on to the cavalry, and the siege engines. “Elephants and heavy horse can move two squares at a time, light horse three. The trebuchets and catapults move only one square at a time, as do the unmounted soldiers, but where the soldiers may move in any direction, the siege engines can only move in the direction they face, and changing this direction will cost one move.”

“What is the difference between the heavy horse and the elephants, then? If they both move at the same rate?”

“Your Grace, have you _seen_ an elephant?” At her amused nod, he went on: “As in the real world, the elephant can do more damage. One will trample a trebuchet, and two together will prevail over the larger catapult. They are harder to kill, as well. An elephant will kill any piece on the board, save the dragon.”

“Oh! I like this game much better already, knowing there are dragons in it.”

“Well, if you want to kill an elephant, you need a dragon, or all of your heavy horse working together. Though this is not the object of the game. The object is to kill the opponent’s king, and protect your own.”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You mean _queen._ ”

“All right, to kill the opponent’s – queen.” He held up his carved king and regarded it dubiously. “I suppose I could whittle off the beard.”

She laughed. “You’d be more likely to behead the poor thing. I shall commission a set of my own, with a proper queen – _if_ this proves worthwhile.”

“The, er, _queen_ is protected by a fortress, which you may place as you will on your half of the board before the start of the game. Your territory is protected by mountains, with which you do likewise.” Tyrion indicated the pieces as he spoke. “Once you place these, they do not move, so you must choose wisely.”

“The fortress should be far from the enemy territory, then. And the mountains around it.”

“That’s one way to do things. Not the only way. May I?” At her nod, he set up the mountains close to the board’s center, with his two mountains slightly to the left and hers slightly to the right. “Now, in an actual game we would each set up our own pieces, with the screen in the middle blocking us from seeing each other’s positions until we began. But this will do for practice. This particular configuration – the mountains angled to each other, like so – is a common starting point.” He’d learned it from Haldon Halfmaester on the _Shy Maid_ , who had told him it was called Selhora’s Tits, after an infamous Volantene whore with enormous and noticeably asymmetrical breasts. This, however, he forbore from mentioning to Daenerys. He pointed to the gap formed by the mountains on the left. “If you think of these spaces between the mountains as passes, you can see that it’s of strategic importance to get there before your opponent.” 

Daenerys nodded, then frowned as he set the fortresses on opposite ends of the board. “Why do you not place them in the corners, so they can only be attacked from two sides, rather than three?”

“Excellent question. You most certainly can place your fortress in the corner, but then you can only _defend_ from two sides as well. It’s a matter of strategy. Do you rely on your position, or do you rely on your catapults?” He held up a carved catapult. The wooden framework cupped a rounded pebble; it was only the size of his thumbnail, but if the entire piece were the size of a real catapult, it would have been a boulder as big as a horse. 

“I rely,” Daenerys said, “on my dragons.”

“Ah, your dragons. Well, Your Grace, in this game you have but one dragon, and it can be removed from the board by this catapult.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I have three dragons.”

“In this game you have _one_ dragon. Here.” He put down the catapult, picked up the dragon piece, and placed it in her hand. 

“This does not look much like a dragon,” she observed. 

Tyrion could not disagree. Though finely carved, it was a sorry representation of the real thing, with stubby wings and a toothy, open mouth. “No doubt it was made by a tradesman who had only seen them in picture books. No living person had seen a real dragon until you brought yours into the world, Your Grace.”

“True enough,” she admitted, and her mouth curved into a small smile.

“Your dragon is the most powerful piece on the board. It moves up to four squares at every turn, which is more than any other piece, and it can move in any direction. It is the only piece that can fly over the mountains, instead of being forced to go around. It defeats all opponents – except for the siege engines, which can bring it down.”

Daenerys put down the carved dragon and picked up the catapult. “Do you think they really can bring down my dragons?” she asked, and Tyrion knew she was not talking about the game.

“I don’t know.” He licked his lips nervously, wishing he had some wine. Even the terrible Mereenese wine would have been a comfort to him. “I suppose it would depend on how well your dragons can maneuver in the air. But it’s worth preparing for, certainly.”

“Just one more thing I must prepare for.” She sighed, and looked out the window.

“And you _will_ be prepared by the time you are ready to go to war. But for now, it is good to take the time to relax – and perhaps, to play a game?”

She turned to him, smiling, though her eyes still looked worried. “All right. Teach me how to defeat my enemies with only one pathetic dragon, and I shall be even more deadly with my three strong children.”

“That is an excellent approach, Your Grace,” said Tyrion. When he’d first heard of this young girl’s plans to liberate Essos and take Westeros from his power-hungry sister, it had struck him ludicrous; surely, she must have more hubris than sense. But as he placed the first of the combat pieces on the board, explaining possible strategies as he did so, he reflected that perhaps he was wrong. If anyone could carry out this audacious plan, it would be Daenerys Targaryen. And, by all the gods, if he could tip the odds in her favor, he would do so.

Someday, he hoped, he’d be standing at her side, giving her what counsel he could. For now, he would teach her _cyvasse_.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Cyvasse (this is not a game 'mix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26738341) by [Netgirl_y2k](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Netgirl_y2k/pseuds/Netgirl_y2k)




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